Art Institute of Chicago

Fountain Panel

Designed by Thomas Jeckyll (English, 1827–1881)

Date

1871

Medium

Bronze

Culture

Norwich

Department

Applied Arts of Europe

Institution

Art Institute of Chicago

In the 1850s, the ironworks firm Barnard, Bishop and Barnards contracted Thomas Jeckyll in an effort to adhere to the decade’s burgeoning design reform. In an era increasingly dominated by cheaply produced, low-quality goods, designers began considering how to improve both the design of objects and the conditions of the workers who made them. Having gained prominence through several successful Japanism installations at international exhibitions, Jeckyll became a fashionable designer and the upper classes sought out his designs. One such patron, Henry Richard Fox Vassall, Lord Holland, commissioned Jeckyll to design decorative panels in bronze for the horse watering-fountains outside his London estate. The flattened perspective of the fish and plants and the stylized waves on the lower register show Jeckyll’s interest in Japanese aesthetics.

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